Sorry, Waylon, we've given up Flash Player on moral grounds, Ergo, we won't be using or watching videos for he foreseeable future.

The Industry, which I realize thinks of itself as Our Master now, has twisted my arm once too often by cutting off my access arbitrarily.

Since it will now cost MONEY to get reconnected, I am giving them the unadigit salute with one hand while I thumb my nose at them with the other.

You might say, "But you're biting off your nose to spite your face," but I say, "No. I am refusing to submit to blackmail."

I got along beautifully without "them" for over sixty years, so I know I will get along just fine without "them" again.

"They" have succeeded at turning a huge segment of the population into addicts. I despise addiction in all its many and varied forms, so I am withdrawing from the scene at least to this extent, and may soon leave altogether.

I hate being manipulated. Giving up a good deal of pleasure and convenience to avoid it is worth the price. It would benefit society if a great many others arrived at the same conclusion and followed suit, but I hold out little hope that i will happen. We are a nation of sheep not shepherds, of followers not leaders, and therefore easily fall prey to every Pied Piper that comes down the pike.

I'd be slow to attribute malice if I were you. Flash is a flaky piece of software, it often needs careful handling. The good news is that better alternatives are gradually superseding it: two years from now, it'll have joined gopher, dialup modems and myspace: relics of the internet's steam age that we're glad not to have to worry about any more.In the meantime, just fix it. Don't spend any money. Often using a different browser can help, eg. firefox, chrome or opera.

Thank you, Jez, but I'm afraid you greatly overestimate my intelligence. I've been told by the "guru" I've been forced to hire –– at $75/hr! –– on an increasing number of occasions that changing browsers is an electronic impossibility, because my Mac won't permit it. He claims it's the Industry's way of virtually forcing us to buy new computers. Since he's part of the industry, I can't imagine why he'd lie about it.

I don't attribute actual "malice," as such, to the industry but rather a kind of greed –– not so much for money but for power and elevated status.

The incessant drive to become bigger, faster, shinier and more "efficient" which pretty well characterized the last century [since the dawn of the Machine Age really] exerts significant pressure on all of us to "keep up."

The coming changes you young people apparently welcome are exactly the reason why a living dinosaur such as I, recoils in dismay at each new twist and turn billed as an "improvement."

I've used Flash for years with great pleasure and no difficulty at all. In the past few months, however, I've had nothing but trouble "keeping it alive" so to speak. Fixing it repeatedly, as I've been forced to do, is not only irritatingly inconvenient it has also become costly.

The "fixes" available are now demanding the purchase of new "services" at about $10/mo in order to complete the 'fix," hence my ire. How could I not believe this is deliberate manipulation on the part of the Industry to sell more product? ;-)

Your guru is literally a scammer. I believe what he is doing is probably illegal, or at least borderline. I know Apple charges more for everything, but this is ridiculous. $75 / hour is ludicrous even for good advice; he is giving you bad advice. Unless your mac is over 10 years old (the old powerpc architecture), there's nothing stopping it from running a different browser.

I didn't think so, AOW. She gave up her male genitalia, c. 1950, and regarded herself in every way as a woman, so I'm quite sure she fully expected to use The Ladies Room.

I have given up Flash Player, –– or rather IT gave ME up for the last time –– so I can no longer post videos, but if the subject truly interests you, there are several videos of Christine Jorgensen at various stages of her life that give a much better idea of what she was all about than the still photos from her era.

My feeling after watching her in action is "If you didn't know, you'd never be able to guess."

I really don't understand your fascination with trannies, FT. IMO, it's another symptom of a cultural problem, not a cause for "celebration" and/or "the grand achievement of some new form of budding "individuality" or "authenticity."

This whole Jenner affair is so much ado do about nothing. If it wasn’t for our US/Western obsession with ‘Zelebs’ (and the revenue that brings with it) we wouldn't be discussing this ‘non-issue’. Instead a trillion syllables have already been thrown to the wind. Homo Celebrititis really has a knack for turning the trivial into something ‘serious’ and trivialising the serious.

Just watching 'The league of Gentlemen' where at The Windermere (B&B) a number of bourgeois sex-deviants are 'exploring the limits of their sexuality'. While a 'sex-guru' is about to reveal the ultimate sex toy (the 'Medusa', lots of tentacle-like tubes and whatnot) the owner of the establishment slips out to the garden centre to pursue some good old fashioned romance with a mundane shop assistant. Hilarious...

According to alternative-right.blogspot, l'affaire Jenner is a PsyOp directed against disempowered Whitey men:

"Look at what we've done to a man who was once the essence of masculine strength and powerful athleticism! Do you really think a nobody like YOU stands a chance if you oppose us? If we can transform the great Bruce Jenner from a strapping Wheaties-box hero into a pathetic, freakishly disfigured, dress-wearing tranny, can you just imagine what we can do to YOU, little man? Therefore, bow down, reck our collective rod; conform to our dictates and serve our interests; fight in our wars, support our mandated social engineering schemes, and worship our christened leaders. In short, emasculate yourself: cease to be defiant, tuck your testicles in, lower your heads, put on your dress, and shuffle away into oblivion like a good little girl, and there will be far less trouble..."

We can never be absolutely sure what motivates another human being. What may seem childish, trivial, superficial, ludicrous, unworthy –– or even insane –– to us may be of profound significance to the one who makes bizarre, disaffecting lifestyle choices.

Not to wax trite, but as has too oft been said, "One man's meat is anther man's poison."

And what is that famous old Indian saying? Something about having no right to judge another till you've walked a mile in his moccasins.

Since its a lot easier to remove a penis than to tack one on and try to pretend it's alive, I imagine it's much harder for a female to become a credibly looking male than the other way around. I mean what would you do for a tallywhacker? You'd be more like a eunuch than a man, wouldn't you?

Not so long ago someone wrote that Agatha Christie had been KNIGHTED by Queen Elizabeth II. Agatha Christie was well-known as a DAME of the British Empire, so how could she possibly have been a KNIGHT? No Knight in my sphere of knowledge and acquaintance would ever allow himself to be called a DAME. (:-s

So Bruce Jenner, the former famed Olympic athlete and member of the ridicules Kardashian family, now wants everyone to think that he is female. He can never be female no matter what surgery he undertakes, or that he fails to! This entire fantasy is in his head. Born a male, his body is a male and his DNA determines his true gender as a male.

The Media organizations exist to make money. That is why this Freak Caitlyn is all over the news. Do people care? Some people are happy and excited and some people are angry or disgusted, but they do care. Well I don’t and that’s why I’m writing this post, because frankly, I’m sick to death about hearing about it. .If people were not interested the media would move on to something people were interested in.Years ago, when I was a Kid, I used to go to Freak Shows to see people like Jenner and the bearded lady. Today, I try my best to just look the other way. And you can’t help hearing about it, I don’t know who I am more fed up about: Duggar or Jenner? Then you have the Kardashian's. Need I say anything further ? And then you also have Moochie Obama.... Oh man now I’m really confused.

You might try to see things from someone else's point of view once in a while. You might be surprised at how much better the world looks –– and how much you feel –– after you've made a determined effort in that direction.

Gratuitous Displays of Extraneous Knowledge Offered Not To Shed Light Or Enhance the Discussion, But For The Primary Purpose Of Giving An Impression Of Superiority are obnoxiously SELF-AGGRANDIZING, and therefore, Subject to Removal at the Discretion of the Censor-in-Residence.